Page 11 of The Affair
“Oh, right,” I answered. “The place with the flat screens?”
“Mmhmm …”
I guessed we were back to one-worded answers again.
“They don’t have delivery yet. Did you want to go out?”
I had no idea where she was going with this. We always ordered from the same place. Or we had since I moved in a year ago. If anything, my mom was a creature of habit.
“No,” she hollered from somewhere in the house. “I just thought you could pick something up.”
Staring down at the journal, I let out a sigh.
“Okay,” I replied, trying not to read too much into the madness that was my mom these days.
She’d just lost her husband. She was allowed to get pizza from somewhere new even if it meant I had to go get it for her.
“Were you this way when Papa died?” I found myself saying to the endless pages before me. Flipping through another few pages, I found one that mentioned my grandfather. It took longer than I’d expected.
Saturday, May 7, 1990
Partly Sunny
High 54, Low 43
Went downtown for groceries and mail. Did some kitchen work. After dinner, I went to the nursing home but didn’t stay long. George wasn’t himself today. After supper, I went to check on William next door. Crocheted a while.
For most of my life, my Papa, George, had been in a nursing home. When I was around the age of ten, he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, and when things had gotten too difficult for him to live at home, the decision had been made to have him put in around-the-clock care.
Growing up, I hadn’t known much about it, but I had known my nana visited him constantly. Religiously. Faithfully.
For ten long years.
Running my fingers across the page, I felt her strength in the words she had written. She’d supported him without fail.
I could do the same.
Standing up, I set the book aside, figuring I could put it away later, and headed for the front door.
I had a pizza to get.
* * *
Pushingmy way through the front door, I juggled the pizza boxes and bags and called out, trying not to drop everything in my hands, “Hey, Mom, I’m home. Hope you’re hungry!”
Considering how long I’d been gone, I was just hoping, at this point, she was still awake.
The infamous new pizza place, Joe’s, had been crammed with locals tonight, all eager to sit in its shiny, new seats and watch whatever was playing on all those flat screens everyone couldn’t stop talking about.
Unfortunately for Joe and his new employees, I wasn’t sure they had anticipated the frenzy a new restaurant could bring to a small town like Pine Hurst. If you drove an hour and a half down the road to Asheville, there was probably a place like this on every corner, but for us, the excitement of a new restaurant only came once in a blue moon, and when it did … we showed up.
Stepping into the kitchen, my arms still laden with boxes and bags, I found my mom. She was sitting at the kitchen table with her head bent forward as she softly spoke into her ancient flip phone.
“Okay, yep. I love you too,” she said to whomever she was speaking to. “Talk to you soon. Buh-bye.”
She quickly hung up and looked up at me, her face somewhat surprised. “Are we having company?”
At first, I didn’t make the connection, but then I saw her peering at the large amount of food in my hands. “Oh, no,” I answered. “The pizza place was seriously behind in their orders. A few people left before their pizzas were done, and rather than toss them, they gave them to me for being so patient. I figured we could graze on them for the next day or so.”
